Sabriya Simon
Marcha da Mulheres Negras 2016
Marcha da Mulheres Negras 2016
Marcha da Mulheres Negras 2016

Priority Areas

Supporting feminist, women’s rights and gender justice movements to thrive, to be a driving force in challenging systems of oppression, and to co-create feminist realities.

Co-Creating Feminist Realities

While we dream of a feminist world, there are those who are already building and living it. These are our Feminist Realities!

What are Feminist Realities?

Feminist Realities are the living, breathing examples of the just world we are co-creating. They exist now, in the many ways we live, struggle and build our lives.

Feminist Realities go beyond resisting oppressive systems to show us what a world without domination, exploitation and supremacy look like.

These are the narratives we want to unearth, share and amplify throughout this Feminist Realities journey.

Transforming Visions into Lived Experiences

Through this initiative, we:

  • Create and amplify alternatives: We co-create art and creative expressions that center and celebrate the hope, optimism, healing and radical imagination that feminist realities inspire.

  • Build knowledge: We document, demonstrate & disseminate methodologies that will help identify the feminist realities in our diverse communities.

  • Advance feminist agendas: We expand and deepen our collective thinking and organizing to advance just solutions and systems that embody feminist values and visions.

  • Mobilize solidarity actions: We engage feminist, women’s rights and gender justice movements and allies in sharing, exchanging and jointly creating feminist realities, narratives and proposals at the 14th AWID International Forum.


The AWID International Forum

As much as we emphasize the process leading up to, and beyond, the four-day Forum, the event itself is an important part of where the magic happens, thanks to the unique energy and opportunity that comes with bringing people together.

We expect the next Forum to:

  • Build the power of Feminist Realities, by naming, celebrating, amplifying and contributing to build momentum around experiences and propositions that shine light on what is possible and feed our collective imaginations

  • Replenish wells of hope and energy as much needed fuel for rights and justice activism and resilience

  • Strengthen connectivity, reciprocity and solidarity across the diversity of feminist movements and with other rights and justice-oriented movements

Learn more about the Forum process

We are sorry to announce that the 14th AWID International Forum is cancelled

Given the current world situation, our Board of Directors has taken the difficult decision to cancel Forum scheduled in 2021 in Taipei. 

Read the full announcement

Find out more!

Related Content

When and Where will the Forum be?

2-5 December, 2024, Bangkok, Thailand! We will gather at the Queen Sirikit National Convention Center (QSNCC) as well as virtually online.

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Leyla Yıldızhan (Deniz Fırat)

My group or I were supposed to participate in the Forum that was canceled in the pandemic, how can I be engaged in this Forum?

We will reconnect with past partners, to ensure past efforts are honored. If your contact information has changed since the last Forum process, please update us so that we may reach you.

CFA 2023 - Forum Theme - EN

Rising Together: Connect, Heal, Thrive

The Forum theme––Rising Together––is an invitation to engage with our whole selves, to connect with each other in focused, caring and brave ways, so that we can feel the heartbeat of global movements and rise together to meet the challenges of these times.

Feminist, women’s rights, gender justice, LBTQI+ and allied movements around the world are at a critical juncture, facing a powerful backlash on previously-won rights and freedoms. Recent years have brought the rapid rise of authoritarianisms, the violent repression of civil society and criminalization of women and gender-diverse human rights defenders, escalating war and conflict in many parts of our world, the continued perpetuation of economic injustices, and the intersecting health, ecological and climate crises.

Our movements are reeling and, at the same time, seeking to build and maintain the strength and fortitude required for the work ahead. We can't do this work alone, in our silos. Connection and healing are essential to transforming persistent power imbalances and fault lines within our own movements. We must work and strategize in interconnected ways, so that we can thrive together. The AWID Forum fosters that vital ingredient of interconnectedness in the staying power, growth and transformative influence of feminist organizing globally.

Abby Lippman

Abby was a pioneering feminist, human-rights activist and former McGill University epidemiologist.

Abby was renowned for championing social causes and for her insightful critiques of reproductive technologies and other medical topics. Specifically, she campaigned against what she called the "geneticization" of reproductive technologies, against hormone replacement therapy and for better, longer research before the approval of discoveries such as the vaccines against the human papillomavirus.

On the news of her passing, friends and colleagues described her fondly as an “ardent advocate” for women’s health.

 


 

Abby Lipman, Canada

CFA 2023 - Online and Hybrid - thai

 ใหม่

การประชุมออนไลน์และแบบผสมผสานรูปแบบ

ผู้เข้าร่วมประชุมออนไลน์สามารถดำเนินรายการในโปรแกรมต่างๆ   เชื่อมต่อและสนทนากับผู้อื่น   และสัมผัสประสบการณ์ความคิดสร้างสรรค์ ศิลปะ และการเฉลิมฉลองของเวที AWID ได้โดยตรง ผู้เข้าร่วม         ที่เชื่อมต่อออนไลน์จะได้พบกับกับโปรแกรมที่เข้มข้นและหลากหลาย ตั้งแต่การประชุมเชิงปฏิบัติการ การอภิปราย  ไปจนถึงโปรแกรมกิจกรรมเยียวยาและการแสดงดนตรี  โดยที่กิจกรรมบางอย่างจะเน้น การเชื่อมต่อระหว่างผู้เข้าร่วมออนไลน์ด้วยกัน       ในขณะที่กิจกรรมอื่นๆจะเป็นการเชื่อมต่อแบบผสมผสาน  เพื่อการมีปฏิสัมพันธ์กันระหว่างผู้เข้าร่วมออนไลน์และผู้ที่อยู่กรุงเทพฯ

Courageous WHRDs in the Media

These 21 Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) worked as journalists and more widely in the media sector in Mexico, Colombia, Fiji, Libya, Nepal, United States, Nicaragua, Philippines, Russia, Germany, France, Afghanistan, and the United Kingdom. 17 of them were murdered and in one case the cause of death is still unclear. On this World Press Freedom Day, please join us in commemorating the life and work of these women by sharing the images below with your colleagues, friends and networks using the hashtags #WPFD2016 and #WHRDs.

The contributions of these women were celebrated and honoured in our Tribute to Women Human Rights Defenders (WHRDs) Who Are No Longer With Us.


Please click on each image below to see a larger version and download as a file

 

Jacqueline Coulibaly Ki-Zerbo

Jacqueline was a pioneering Malian/Burkinabe feminist, nationalist and educator.

She taught English in Senegal, before being recruited in 1961 as an English teacher at the Lycée Philippe Zinda Kaboré in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. Through her activism, she was involved in the popular uprising of January 3, 1966. Between 1961 and 1966, Jacqueline was also responsible for the trade union press, Voices of the Teachers. She was appointed as the head of the Normal Course for Young Girls (now known as Nelson Mandela High School) until 1974, and dedicated herself to girls’ education and advancing women’s rights.

In 1984 she was awarded the Paul G. Hoffmann Award for outstanding work in national and international development.


 

Jacqueline Coulibaly Ki-Zerbo, Mali/ Burkina Faso

CFA 2023 - Submit Button - thai

Research methology

Over eight years, we did four global surveys and built a research methodology.

In 2013, we published three global reports. These reports confirm that women’s rights organizations are doing the heavy lifting to advance women’s rights and gender equality by using diverse, creative and long-term strategies, all while being underfunded.

Our 2010 global survey showed that the collective income of 740 women’s organizations around the world totaled only USD 104 million. Compare this with Greenpeace International, one organization with a 2010 budget of USD 310 million1. Imagine the impact these groups could have if they were able to access all the financial resources they need and more?

AWID’s WITM research has catalyzed increased funding for women’s rights organizing. WITM research was a driving force behind the Catapult crowdfunding platform, which has raised USD 6.5 million for women’s rights. The Dutch Government cited WITM research as a reason for its unprecedented MDG 3 Fund of EU 82 million. WITM research has also led to the creation of several new funds: FRIDA – The Young Feminist Fund, the Indigenous Women’s Fund, Fundo Elas, the Mediterranean Women’s Fund and the Rita Fund.

Funding trends analyses

While the WITM research has shed important light on the global funding landscape, AWID and partners have identified the need to dig deeper, to analyze funding trends by region, population and issue. In response, organizations are now using AWID’s WITM research methodology to do their own funding trends analyses. For example, in November 2013, Kosova Women’s Network and Alter Habitus – Institute for Studies in Society and Culture published Where is the Money for Women’s Rights? A Kosovo Case Study.

At the same time, AWID continues to collaborate with partners in Where is the Money for Indigenous Women’s Rights (with International Indigenous Women’s Forum and International Funders for Indigenous Peoples) and our upcoming Where is the Money for Women’s Rights in Brazil? (with Fundo Elas).

Several organizations have also conducted their own independent funding trends research, deepening their understanding of the funding landscape and politics behind it. For example, the South Asian Women’s Fund was inspired by AWID’s WITM research to conduct funding trends reports for each country in South Asia, as well as a regional overview. Other examples of research outside of AWID include the collaboration between Open Society Foundations, Mama Cash, and the Red Umbrella Fund to produce the report Funding for Sex Workers Rights, and the first-ever survey on trans* and intersex funding by Global Action for Trans* Equality and American Jewish World Service.


So'oalo Roger

So'oalo was a fervent human rights advocate, especially pertaining to the rights of the LGBTQI community in the Pacific.

She was a member of the Samoa Fa’afafine Association (SFA) and a passionate advocate for the acknowledgement of a third gender in the island country. Under her leadership, the SFA pushed for the recognition of the validity and rights of the fa’afafine community.

She was also a pioneer in articulating the links between human rights, exploitation of fa’afafines in Samoa and the Pacific, and the health, wellbeing and security of the LGBTQI community.

She was an inspiration, a visionary and her dedication to the pursuit of rights for her community is admirable and will be remembered.


 

So'oalo Roger, Samoa

Are there some red line topics we should avoid submitting?

The AWID Forum has always been a space that doesn’t shy away from much needed and difficult conversations. We welcome these submissions when the organizers can carefully hold a respectful and safer space for the participants.

Reclaiming the Commons

Definition

There are varied conceptualizations about the commons notes activist and scholar Soma Kishore Parthasarathy.

Conventionally, they are understood as natural resources intended for use by those who depend on their use. However, the concept of the commons has expanded to include the resources of knowledge, heritage, culture, virtual spaces, and even climate. It pre-dates the individual property regime and provided the basis for organization of society. Definitions given by government entities limit its scope to land and material resources.

The concept of the commons rests on the cultural practice of sharing livelihood spaces and resources as nature’s gift, for the common good, and for the sustainability of the common.

Context

Under increasing threat, nations and market forces continue to colonize, exploit and occupy humanity’s commons.

In some favourable contexts, the ‘commons’ have the potential to enable women, especially economically oppressed women, to have autonomy in how they are able to negotiate their multiple needs and aspirations.

Feminist perspective

Patriarchy is reinforced when women and other oppressed genders are denied access and control of the commons.

Therefore, a feminist economy seeks to restore the legitimate rights of communities to these common resources. This autonomy is enabling them to sustain themselves; while evolving more egalitarian systems of governance and use of such resources. A feminist economy acknowledges women’s roles and provides equal opportunities for decision-making, i.e. women as equal claimants to these resources.

Photo: Ana Abelenda / AWID, 2012

Learn more about this proposition

Part of our series of


  Feminist Propositions for a Just Economy